


Classroom War

by Khaelis



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Teachers, Enemies to Lovers, Eventual Romance, Eventual Smut, F/M, Fluff, Fun, Humour, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-15
Updated: 2018-11-27
Packaged: 2019-05-07 09:32:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 17,902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14668242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Khaelis/pseuds/Khaelis
Summary: He's the head of the science faculties.She's the head of the humanities faculties.All it takes is a centrifuge and a book.The war is on.





	1. Fine!

**Author's Note:**

> So, I might have started another story. Again. Kill me please.
> 
> But well, I've wanted to write a University AU for so long I couldn't help it.
> 
> This is just a short prologue to test the waters, but if you like the idea the next chapters will be longer!
> 
> I hope you'll enjoy this little prologue!

* * *

 

 

They had never been friends. Just colleagues, crossing paths in the corridors, exchanging shallow greetings and indifferent smiles. Nothing particularly surprising about it, given the everlasting rivalry that existed between them. Well, not between them, per se, but between their faculties. Things had been fine for the past few months - and by fine, he meant that there had been no real confrontation, apart from the usual taunts and cheap shots, which clearly pointed to a semblance of entente cordiale. Until the budget meeting, three short days before. That start of the war.

 

He had won the first battle when he had secured the better part of the budget for his own faculties, and left her with a thin envelope that would never be enough for the project she had defended before the president of the university. He had to admit, the science faculties always had the upper hand over the others, and while he had felt a flutter of guilt at her obvious rage, he had also been delighted to know he’d be given the centrifuge he had been asking for for weeks. Not his fault science required money, after all. A centrifuge was so much better than revamping a library and buying stupid books about obscure notions and pointless theories no one understood anyway. Science mattered. Literature, much less so.

 

He leaned back in his desk chair and grinned at the order slip tacked on the edge of his computer screen, unfazed by the obscene string of numbers that read the price of his new toy - though he would make sure not to call this extravagant equipment a toy but when he was alone. Or maybe when she, and only she, would be around, just to see the fury on her face. That could be fun. And he rather liked her face when she was furious. How her eyes burnt and her full lips pinched. He rather liked her. Period.  How she pinned him on the spot with a stare and made his stomach twist with her threats. The thrill she sent down his spine when she smiled at him, no matter how vicious and spiteful the smile was. The fire she sent through his veins when she turned her back to him and swaggered off on her high heels, in her tight skirt. He would never admit it, of course. Never. She was the enemy, and he refused to lose the upcoming battles because of a ridiculous smile and an ostentatious skirt.

 

A bell chimed from his speakers and a small window popped up on his screen, signaling a new email. 

  
  


“Speak of the Devil,” he muttered under his breath as he read the name of the sender.

  
  


_ Sent you a student. Hope your toy is worth it. Dr. T. _

  
  


He barely had time to start typing an answer, to ask what she had meant by those enigmatic words, that a sharp knock echoed on the door.

  
  


“Come in,” he called out, readjusting his tie and wiping his annoyed frown from his features. 

  
  


A student stepped into his office, fingers clenched around a piece of paper, obviously distressed - he noticed the half-dried tears on her pale cheeks and the way she anxiously nibbled her lip.

  
  


“Doctor Smith,” she greeted, pulling on the straps of her backpack, daring to take a few steps towards him. “I’ve been told you have that book, and I could borrow it.”

“What book?” he asked, then took the paper she handed him - a paper that read a title about literary concepts he had never heard of before and was quite unable to understand.

“Doctor Tyler told me you had it, and I need it for a very important paper,” she said, hope written all over her face.

“I don’t have it, no,” he shook his head, giving the piece of paper back. “I don’t know why she’d tell you that, surely she must know…”

  
  


He stopped in the middle of his sentence and swallowed the curse he wanted to grunt.  _ The little… _ He offered a shrug of apology and crossed his fingers over his desk, trying to keep his composure and calm intact despite the disappointment he could feel oozing from the desperate student.

  
  


“I’m sorry, I don’t have it,” he repeated with a smile of compassion. “Better double-check with the library, eh?”

“Nah, they don’t have it. Nevermind. Thanks anyway.”

  
  


He kept his smile hanging on his lips until the door closed, and his face contorted in anger as he hurried to pick up his phone and dial her number.

  
  


“What the Hell was that about, Doctor Tyler?” he grumbled into his phone after she greeted him with a merry hello.

“Oh, I’m sorry, didn’t you have the book, Doctor Smith?” she answered - and he could feel the pride and thrill of vengeance in her voice.

“Why would I have such a ridiculous book? That student was almost crying, for God’s sake, that was cruel, even for you.”

“Well, you see, that book was on the list I gave the library to weeks ago, but guess what?” she said, her tone growing just a tad more irritated. “Not enough budget, what a surprise! All those expensive books my students need and can’t buy? They should be in the library right now, but a childish scientist thought it better to invest in a useless toy that costs a fortune.”

“It is not a toy!” he cried out into the phone, slamming his palm on his armrest - now wasn’t the time to tease her about the toy dimension of the equipment, he believed. “It is a first class centrifuge I need for very serious experiments! Just go back to your prehistoric literature and write a poem to the president if don’t agree with his decision!”

“Fine!” she almost shouted back. “Do me a favour and centrifuge your stupid brain, maybe some good will come out of it!”

“Fine! Have a nice day, Doctor Tyler!”

  
  


He smashed his phone down on the desk and directed an obscene gesture at the name still displayed on his screen, his other hand feverishly running through his spikes of hair. God, how that woman could get on his nerves. Just for a stupid book about stupid things only stupid people could understand. He groaned loudly and let his head fall on his keyboard with a dull thump.

 

The bell chimed again a short moment later, and he peeked at the screen to see a new message had popped up, under the nonsensical string of letters he must have sent by inadvertance when his forehead had crashed on his keyboard.

  
  


_ You need to read some books about anger management, Doctor Smith. Oh wait. We don’t have the books. _

  
  


He blew a resolved sigh through his nose and straightened in his chair, staring at the cynical message. Fine. Doctor Tyler wanted to wage war on him, then so be it. She would get her war. But he was determined to win.

 

* * *

 


	2. Fission

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which you'll find Doctor Tyler might be better at this game than he is.
> 
> So, yeah, new chapter for this silly story!  
> It's very different from what I usually write, much lighter, and I'm having loads of fun writing this!  
> I've decided to keep the chapters short, between 1500-2000 so I can update it more often and still have time to update my other stories (don't forget to check out "Different" if you're interested in some Teninch Casanova x Fanny Price!)
> 
> I hope you'll enjoy this chapter as much as the first one!
> 
> Thank you for all the positive comments I received, it really means a lot!

* * *

 

 

He grinned proudly as he tore the cardboard of the parcel he had received on his desk, taking out a heavy book he had ordered. He had spent his own money on something he would never use, just for the sake of retaliation - and because he couldn't wait to see her furious face again. The motivation was clear. Get his revenge for that cheap short she had aimed at him the week before. It was simple, efficient, and not evil enough to risk much more than a glare and another fit of anger. Oh, he couldn't wait.

 

He tucked his book under his arm and walked out of his office, unable to wipe the smug smile from his features.  _ You’ll get your stupid book _ , he thought as he walked into one of the humanities corridors that sprouted from the mail hall, greeting a few of his own students on the way. He had never been to her office before - not for lack of interest, because he had wanted to visit her for two years, but for lack of any precise reason that would leave her wondering why he had even bothered when they had a phone and emails. Phone and emails had this one disadvantage he couldn't see her, skirt and high heels and tight blouse, but well. He always managed to find a good spot at the canteen to make up for all those times he didn’t visit her - namely, that one table behind the plastic plant that shielded him from her, but from where he had a very good view of her legs under the table.

 

He knocked on her door, grinned even brighter when she answered, and stepped into her office with the firm intention to thoroughly enjoy her rage. He was momentarily struck by the size of the office, less than half the size of his, and he realized a lighter budget was not the only bad thing about the humanities. Especially since, being the literary person that she was, piles and piles of books were stacked against the walls, precarious towers that would all tumble down if she picked but one of them. 

 

She was wearing that light pink blouse that day, one of his favourite, and he was disappointed he couldn't see what skirt she had paired it with.  _ No _ . He wasn't there to watch her legs. Revenge, he remembered.

  
  


“Doctor Smith, what can I do for you?” she greeted with a smile, taking off the black glasses perched on the bridge of her nose - he would have liked to tell her to leave them on, because he didn’t think he had seen anything sexier in his whole life, but he managed to keep that thought for himself.

“Doctor Tyler,” he nodded, shutting the door behind him with a kick of his heel. “I got you a little something I thought you might like. Remember that book we, er, argued about last week?”

“Yeah, I do, thanks for reminding me,” she sighed, leaning back in her chair, tucking a temple of her glasses in her cleavage. “So?”

“Well, I kinda felt bad, you know, I got this brand new,  _ amazing  _ centrifuge and you’re left with nothing,” he said - he made sure to sound falsely saddened and offered an ironic smile of compassion. “So, I got you the book.”

“Did you?”

  
  


He nodded with a grin, the delighted flutters of thrill blooming in his stomach at her surprise and immediate softening. Oh, she really wanted that book. And she was genuinely happy he had bought it. It made it even better. The downfall would be rough.

  
  


“Here it is, new edition and all,” he said, letting the book plop down on the desk, putting its title on prominent display. “Cost me fifty quids, but well, I’ve got a centrifuge worth a few thousands so I thought… You know, consolation prize.”

“It’s in French,” she noted with a frown as she flipped through the pages. “All in French.”

“Oh, is it?”

 

He faked an outraged gasp, and started to ramble about how it hadn't been made clear enough on the website, and how they would hear about it and he would get his money back because it was unacceptable to pay that much for a few pages in a wrong language. Of course, he was jubilating at her momentary perplexity, but on the inside only. Well, probably a bit on the outside too, because she raised an eyebrow and smiled, the kind of amused smile that had him observe her with a hint of suspicion. She wasn’t disillusioned, like he had hoped she’d be. She looked… Pleased. Now, that wasn’t part of the plan. Something must have gone wrong somewhere.

  
  


“Thank you very much, Doctor Smith,” she simply shrugged, shoving the book in a drawer. “That you would go to such extents is proof of your repentance.”

“But it's in French,” he pointed out, frustrated that she wouldn't make any more comments about it when he had expected, and even hoped for a tantrum.

“Yes, it is,” she smiled, slipping her glasses back on the tip of her nose - ah, that looked much better. “Good thing I speak French.”

“You… You do?” he asked as he watched his plan crumble down to ashes along with his confidence.

“Of course I do, majored in French literature, did one of my thesis about Molière. Why the disappointment? At least you didn't spend your money on a silly joke. I can actually use it. Gonna need to do a few extra hours to translate what my student needs, but all in all, this is better than nothing. So, thanks.”

“Oh, good, then, very good,” he could only nod, trying hard not to let the his abatement show on his face. “I could send it back and order the good one, though, I really...”

“Don’t sweat it, Doctor Smith,” she grinned as she handed him a small file of papers. “I know what you wanted to do. Sorry it didn't work.”

“No idea what you're talking about, I just wanted to help you.”

“Right. Now, I have work to do, so…”

  
  


He nodded with a sigh of defeat, but it was when he started to turn on his feet that he absent-mindedly read the title written in sharp little letters on the top of file. A title he knew all too well.

  
  


“Wait, what's this?” he asked as he sifted through the sheets to make sure it was what he thought it was. 

“Your article about nuclear fission in subaquatic rift currents was good, but your whole theory doesn’t look very professional,” she started to explain much too matter-of-factly compared to the scornful twitch that pulled on her lips. “You'll find annotations and corrections. It might be science, but if you can’t spell all your gibberish properly, you won’t get published. You can leave it as it is, of course, but I doubt you'll go far with  _ subacquatick  _ rifts.”

“You went through the trouble of reading my article just to taunt me on stupid grammar?” he huffed, both angry and embarrassed to see so much red painted over the pages.

“Spelling, Doctor Smith. The grammar isn’t that good either, though, you'll find a few notes about that too. Page three, you say one thing and the exact opposite two lines further. It matters when you’re talking about potentially deadly stuff, just saying.”

“This is a paper I am still working on, I typed my notes at two in the morning, okay? How did you even get this, you snoop, I only posted it to my personal drive.”

“And on the staff Intranet. It appeared in the news stream, under the glorious title, hm, what was it? Oh yes,  _ FML this fissions my ass _ . Thanks for the laugh, by the way.”

“No, I didn’t, I can’t have! It wasn’t even on the page yesterday when I logged in, and the latest news posted dates back to three weeks ago.”

“Don’t get your pink panties in a wad, your ass suffers enough as it is, it seems.”

“Just tell me how you found it, for God’s sake!” he huffed, angrily rolling the file in his fist as if he wanted to whack her head with it. 

“The Intranet,” she repeated, undaunted by the way he braced himself against the edge of the desk to bend towards her, menacing and eyes shooting thunderbolts. “I knew you’d posted it by accident, so I saved a copy and deleted the post to spare you the embarrassment. But you know what, you’re right. Not my problem. I’ll just post it again and you can deal with it yourself. Now stop  _ fissioning  _ my own ass with your childish enterprises and go back to your toy to grow your mushrooms. Might want to stop by your computer first, though. People don’t need to know about your current anal health.”

 

He watched, powerless, her fingers type words he couldn’t read and click several times on her mouse. Surely, she wouldn’t… But then, she cocked her head at him with a bright smile and mouthed a  _ done _ . Obviously, she would. And she had. Yes, he had been looking for trouble and willingly tugged on the Devil’s tail, but that didn’t prevent anger from boiling in his veins. If anyone else found this article, under that title, he wouldn’t bet much on his reputation for the coming weeks. He’d need to invest in earplugs rather than in books to mute the sneers and laughs that would bury him under mountains of shame.

  
  


“Go to Hell, Doctor Tyler,” he seethed, shoving the rumpled sheets in his pocket. “I won’t argue with someone who can’t differentiate between mushrooms and microbiological cultures!”

“Fine, just go, then,” she shrugged as she planted her fingers on her keyboard and waited for him to actually go. “Thanks for the book again, that was very thoughtful of you. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to prepare for my next course. You’re welcome to attend, it’s about latin etymology, you might learn a thing or two about spelling  _ subaquatic _ .”

“I know how to spell  _ subaquatic _ , I wrote this in a rush, alright? I just… Nevermind. Have a nice day, Doctor Tyler. Enjoy your stupid book.”

  
  


He stormed out of her office before he could drown in her sickening smugness and rushed back to his office, his highest priority now consisting in deleting any trace of the humiliation eulogy this post was. He sat behind his computer and hurried to log in, opened the page he was looking for and scrolled through it to find the subject of the offence. Sure enough, there it was, posted under his name, but it seemed Doctor Tyler had deemed necessary to add an attachment.  _ Introduction to Latin Etymology _ . He made a face at his screen and erased the article from the database with a few clicks. She was saucy, that woman. He loved it. Still, he would need to up the ante and hit harder if he wanted a chance at winning.

 

The email bell chimed again. His face blanched as he read the message she had sent him and his hands went to his fly.

  
  


_ I didn’t say _ pink panties _ by accident, BTW. Lovely underwear, Doctor Smith. Dr. T. _

  
  


He zipped up his fly and fell back in his chair with a groan.

 

* * *

 


	3. Bite

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone, new chapter for this little story!
> 
> I won't lie, I'm not planning this one to be very long - probably around 10 chapters, but I'll do my best to keep it fun and fluffy!
> 
> I hope you'll enjoy it! :-)

* * *

 

 

_ Pretend inferiority and encourage his arrogance. _

 

She smirked as she read those words in the book opened on her desk.  _ The Art of War _ . Doctor Smith wanted to wage war on her, then so be it. He would get his war. But she was determined to win. She might have lost the budget general battle because the president had always had a soft spot for his cherished science faculties, but that was fine. She didn’t need a fancy centrifuge and in depth knowledge of nuclear fission to fight her own battles against her archenemy.

 

She knew him by heart, this one Doctor Smith. And she knew his arrogance was legendary. Not only did he belittled the colleagues from the other faculties, but he also ridiculed the work of most of his own colleagues. She had witnessed it first hand, at a physics conference given by a confrere rom the applied science department, some shadowy thing about quantum physics and teleportation. While everyone had been impressed by the tremendous amount of research he had done on the subject, Doctor Smith had snorted and sighed for two hours, until he’d had enough of what he called _ nonsensical theories only based on more nonsense _ , thrown a tantrum in the auditorium and made it his personal duty to bring down every single bit of the theory. She thought he had probably been right. Still, his egotism and disdain had been painful to watch.

 

Painful, yes. But also oddly appealing. She had been sitting on the same row, four seats to his right. So, she had seen. More than that, she had  _ looked _ . How he had risen from his small folding chair, running fingers through his mane to give it the shape it’d lost after two hours spent head in his palm. How he had pushed his glasses up on the bridge of his nose with a haughty sniff and cleared his throat. How his shirt had tightened over his shoulder when he’d bent forward on the tiny desk. The dimples, the crinkles at the corner of his eyes, the pouty lip, all following his grimaces and frowns on the arrogant train to prove he was some kind of underrated genius. 

 

God, out of all the teachers roaming around in this sodden university, why did it have to be him? Sure, he had great hair, a handsome face and a derriere she could stare at for hours without ever getting tired, but that didn’t make him any less of a cocky prat. She certainly wouldn’t wave the white flag because of a smug pretty boy who couldn’t even write  _ subaquatic  _ properly.

 

She needed to find a way to secure herself at least one more victory. Sun Tzu. Praise his clever little brain, applaud his superior intellect, flatter his planet-sized ego. Let his confidence and pride build over her compliments, and then strike it all down at once. Maybe that would hurt too much. Maybe that was too cruel.

 

But, from the corner of her eyes, she saw the book he had bought her - most certainly not by kindness of heart - and she decided she didn’t care. Doctor Smith wanted his war, he would get his war. Remained to find how she could hit him. Hard.

 

She closed her book just as a knock was heard.

  
  


“Come in,” she called out, taking off her glasses to fold them over the cover.

  
  


A delivery man appeared with a large cardboard box in his arms he dropped on a chair after a casual greeting.

  
  


“I need your signature here, Doctor,” he said as he handed her a slip of paper.

“This is supposed to go to the science faculties,” she noted, reading the name on the pink ticket. “Doctor Smith, his office is on the other side of the main auditorium.”

“Dunno, I was told to come here. Look, I’m in a bit of a rush, I don’t really have time to run around.”

“Fine,” she sighed, taking is pen to write her name before she inked it with her stamp. “Hope whatever’s in this isn’t dangerous.”

“Dunno,” he repeated as he shoved the paper in his hip pack. “‘M just here to deliver. Have a nice day, Doctor.”

  
  


She looked at the box and saw the top was pierced with dozens of little holes, a nauseating smell filtering through the orifices. She definitely heard a sound coming from it, but she wasn’t about to investigate - what belonged to the mental house the science building was would remain in the science building. 

 

She picked up her phone and dialed his number, just hoping he wouldn’t be busy teaching or refuse to answer when her name would pop up on his display.

  
  


“Miss me already, Doctor Tyler?” his voice sneered through the receiver - and she was almost tempted to hang up immediately.

“Got something for you in my office, smartass,” she simply answered, glancing at box with a scrunched up nose. “It stinks and it takes up too much space. Just come get it, will you?”

“I’m busy, working on a new project with my amazing centrifuge,” he said, his grin flowing along his words. “Groundbreaking discoveries, scientific breakthroughs, that kind of stuff. Not that  _ dead  _ languages don’t matter, of course, but I doubt your Latin will ever save anyone.”

“Come get it or it flies through the window, you git,” she huffed before she angrily slammed her phone back down.

  
  


She pondered for a moment if she just ought to leave the box outside her office so she wouldn’t have to see his stupid face and be tempted to slap it, but a chime rang and a message popped up on her screen.

  
  


_ Coming, don’t actually throw it out the window. *risus* I know it’s just brutum fulmen anyway. Dr. S. _

 

She puffed at his use of the Latin phrases, knowing he was just trying to get on her nerves again, and leaned back in her chair with her arms crossed over her chest. Sometimes, she really hated that contemptuous man. 

 

He knocked on the door a few minutes later - his legs longer than stilts probably helped crossing the distance faster, she supposed.

  
  


“ _ Ave _ , Doctor Tyler,” he grinned, raising his right hand in a Roman salute as he entered her office. “So, what’s in this box, then?”

“You’ll have to find out yourself, I didn’t open it,” she shrugged as he picked up a pair of scissors on her desk and sliced the thick tape. “I just know it moves, and it stinks. Pretty good summary of what happens in your asylum.”

“At least, things happen in my asylum, no one dies of boredom learning languages you’ll only ever speak with the dead,” he smiled, twirling the scissors around his index. “Let’s see, shall we?”

  
  


She sighed as he rolled his sleeves up theatrically and wiggled his fingers before he peeled one side of the top of the box. He sneaked a peek inside the box, squinted when he realized it was too dark inside to see anything, and reached inside, obviously forgetting about the  _ moving  _ dimension of the contents.

 

She didn’t react much when he shrieked loudly, thinking he was just indulging in one of his silly jokes, but then he snapped the box close and tightly wrapped his fingers around his hand.

  
  


“If that’s your idea of revenge, Doctor Tyler, let me tell you it sucks,” he glared at her above the rim of his glasses. “I knew you had a rubbish sense of humour, but this…”

“What do you…” she started with a sigh, but stopped dead in the middle of her sentence when she saw the blood steadily dripping from his extremity. “Shit, what the Hell is that?”

“You tell me,” he growled as she hurried to find a first aid kit in her drawer. “Seriously, that’s a bit much, don’t you think?”

“It’s not me, alright?” she defended herself, motionning for him to sit on her chair. “Yes, we’ve had our differences, but I’d never go as far as hurting you on purpose, okay?”

“So you wish to tell me this arrived at your office by accident?” he frowned over eyes flooded with irritation. “Right, what a wonderful coincidence this is, isn’t it?”

“Well it did. Now shut it, Doctor Smith, and give me your hand.”

  
  


He huffed loudly, but he still did. She gently cupped his hand and wiped most of the blood with a clean handkerchief to better see the nature of the wound.

  
  


“Snake bite,” she told him as she reached for a cotton ball in her kit she was quick to soak in alcohol. “Non-venomous, in case you were worried about that. See the four rows of tooth marks? That’s the kind of bite you want.”

“For someone who hasn’t planned this, you sure know a lot about snake bites,” he said, wincing lightly when she pressed her cotton over the injury.

“When you spent your summer camps in the same snake-infested forest five years in a row, you learn rather quickly,” she smiled - and she was relieved to see his features soften as he understood it really wasn’t her doing. “It wasn’t me, I promise.”

  
  


He kept quiet after that, and she took her time to properly clean the strings of tiny lesions that spread from the base of his thumb to the middle of the back of his hand. A light bruise was starting to colour his skin, the little red dots lost in the shades of green and blue, but it wasn’t serious. She probably spent more time than necessary cleaning the wound, but she rather enjoyed the feel of his large palm over hers, and how his long fingers lightly squeezed the side of her hand. She could enjoy the truce, because he seemed to enjoy it too, if the way he leaned into her touch was any indication.

  
  


“Why do you even have a kit in your office?” he asked with a grin, watching as she finally picked up a bandage and started to roll it around his hand. “The worse than can happen in here is a paper cut.”

“And snake bites, obviously,” she retorted as she pulled a bit tighter on the white gauze.

“Obviously,” he nodded, pinching his lips when she pressed just a bit too hard over the wound to stick her medical tape. 

“There, done.”

  
  


She released his hand and packed her kit away while he worked his fingers to make sure they were still fully functional. Once reassured, he went back to the box and sntached the piece of paper taped to the side - he thought it might have been wiser to start there, but he kept this comment to himself.

  
  


“Rat snake, for Mister Graham,” he read in the small box dedicated to the description of the parcel. “Now I get the extra dead mice we received last week. Sorry I blamed you, Doctor Tyler. This shouldn’t have landed in your office.”

“Pardon?” she asked, stunned to hear that word coming out of his mouth.

“I said, this parcel shouldn’t have been delivered to you,” he repeated with a shrug, scratching the back of his head just a little sheepishly. “I should take it back to the biology department, whatever it is they plan to do with that thing.”

“You should indeed, Doctor Smith,” she agreed - of course, he wouldn’t repeat that word, but she knew he had said it, and that was enough. “Don’t need a snake in my office, thanks very much.”

“Quite right,” he nodded as he taped the top of the box again to make sure the reptile wouldn't slither away on his way back.

  
  


He picked up his box in his arms and offered a quick nod of the head as a goodbye, but he stopped by the door and turned on his feet.

  
  


“Fancy a coffee one of these days?” he asked, much too casual to sound natural.

  
  


She blinked, gaped at him for a second, until she understood the meaning of his question. 

  
  


“Huh, sure, why not,” she answered, quite unable to decide if this was a genuine, friendly request or another one of his evil plans.

“Alright,” he smiled softly. “We’ll catch up later. Have a nice day, Doctor Tyler. And thanks for the bandage.”

  
  


She stared at the closed door for long minutes after he was gone with his snake, drumming her fingers on her desk. Doctor Smith wanted to share a coffee. And he had thanked her. Well, maybe the snake  _ was  _ venomous, after all.

 

* * *

 


	4. Milan

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry I took so long to update this, but I've had a lot on my hands!  
> So, one more little chapter for this story, more trouble ahead, but I think it'll all get better soon!
> 
> I hope you'll like it, thank you for all the lovely comments I got while I was away, and sorry again for the lack of updates recently!

* * *

 

 

_ Hope you’re ready for it. Coming in five minutes, we can go together. Just need to get my prints. Dr Smith _

  
  


She frowned at the message that popped up in the corner of her screen and gulped down her small sip of boiling coffee. She had no idea where they needed to go, and she didn’t know much more about the nature of that  _ it _ . She checked her schedule of the day on her computer, but there was nothing out of the ordinary about her planning - same boring classes given to first year postgraduates, same annoying photocopying sessions, same nerve-wracking research for her article. Nothing that justified such a message and a visit from her archenemy. He must have gotten the wrong date, or better yet, the wrong person. She wasn’t exactly in the mood to deal with that contemptuous man. It was just  _ that  _ kind of day. An alarm clock that didn’t ring, a shower with no hot water, a car that broke down in the middle of a busy avenue. The last thing she needed was an insufferable git over her back.

 

She shrugged it off as a simple miscommunication and leaned back into her chair. Hopefully, time would fly. She usually wasn’t in any hurry to go back to her cold and empty flat, but that day was an exception. She was sure her exhaustion showed, no matter how well she had hidden the black circles under eyes with her miracle foundation. She was just as sure she looked completely dishevelled, that her clothes didn’t match, and she was almost certain she had forgotten to put her eyeliner under her left eye. Yes, it was most probable she looked like a downright mess that morning. It didn't matter. Just two lessons in an auditorium so big no one would clearly see her face, and then she’d scurry back into her office and lock the door. That was a good plan.

 

The mail bell chimed again, and while she expected another message from the same Doctor, the name of a very different sender appeared on the screen. A certain President Marshall.

  
  


“Are you shitting me?” she cursed through a whisper, eyes roaming over the message and a big ball of anxiety settling low in her stomach.

 

_ Dear staff, _

_ I hereby confirm the annual meeting about the extracurricular trip budget will take place this morning at 9:00 in conference room 2. _

_ Friendly reminder to all, no pipe dreams, part of this budget was allocated to the science faculty earlier this year and the funds are limited. History and languages will be favoured over physics and biology, but every proposition will be carefully studied. _

_ Please do not forget to mail students about cancelled lessons. _

_ I’ll see you all in 15 minutes. Good luck everyone! _

_ P. Marshall _

  
  


Her head shot up at the sound of the door opening, and she gaped at him. Doctor Smith, full formal suit with a matching tie, old chucks turned into black polished shoes, glasses perched on the bridge of his nose, a full stack of copies cradled against his chest and a computer case dangling in his hand.

  
  


“Doctor Tyler,” he greeted with a smile - a smile that disappeared when he noticed her appearance, replaced by pinched lips to keep a laugh in. “Oh my, did you get hit by a truck this morning?. That must have hurt.”

“Shut up, Smith, now is really not the time,” she snapped as she feverishly sifted through the papers in her drawer in the vain hope of finding something, anything that could save her.

“Quite right,” he nodded, clearing his throat to chase the persistent tickle that wanted to turn into a giggle. “I thought you’d have prepared better, you know, given I already won the main department budget. My centrifuge works perfectly well, by the way, thanks for asking.”

“I didn’t ask about your bloody toy, and shut the Hell up, I need to think.”

  
  


She looked at the time, realized there was only a few minutes left before they’d have to go, and realized there was no point in going to the meeting at all. She had nothing. She groaned into her palms as he put his copies down on her desk and plopped down on the chair with a grin she wanted nothing more but to erase it from his stupid face with a slap.

  
  


“Shame you didn’t know about the meeting, isn’t it?” he chuckled, proudly rubbing a hand over his stack of paper. “What city would you have chosen?”

“Don’t know. Milan, probably, they have the most amazing Latin section I know of,” she shrugged, staring at the desk as if she could picture her chances turning to ashes. “We did Exeter last year, because there wasn’t enough budget for that kind of activities, but.... Wait, hold on a minute.”

  
  
  


She squinted at him suspiciously, and her suspicions were only confirmed when his lips twitched and his grin faltered.

  
  


“How come you know I didn’t know about it, Doctor Smith?” she asked, much calmer on the outside than on the inside - inside, she was positively boiling and ready to explode.

“I meant, you  _ forgot _ ,” he hurried to correct, though it was obvious from his nervous shrug he had betrayed himself. “Or didn’t get the email, or didn’t read it. How should I know?”

  
  


He seemed to shrink on his chair when she rose from her own seat and leant towards him, eyes shooting daggers and whole body oozing anger. He tried to look away, but she was pinning him. He loved it when she looked furious, but that day, he believed he might have gone a step too far. She knew he had something to do with it and she wasn’t about to let him survive this, by the looks of it. 

  
  


“Do you really think I would have forgotten about this?’ she seethed, dangerously close to his face. “That I would have missed the opportunity to get something I deserve so much more than you do?”

“Probably not,” he shook his head - and he was quick to put his computer case between his feet, should she decide to snatch it away from him and throw it against the wall. “But like I said, maybe you didn't read the email.”

“I read all my emails, just like every goddamned professor in this university, and you know it.”

“Then you didn't get it, so what? I'm not to blame, alright?”

“I receive every useless email about broken toilets and painted doors but I don’t receive the one about this bloody annual meeting?” she chuckled bitterly. “Quite a coincidence, isn’t it?”

“Well it is,” he huffed as a meager defense, folding his arms over his chest.

“Really? A coincidence? Come on Smith, say it. This is your doing again.”

  
  


He opened his mouth, closed it, crossed his hands over his stack of paper, opened it again. But no words came out. Either he insisted it wasn’t his fault when she was perfectly aware it was, or he admitted he might have played his part in this scheme when he was perfectly aware she would hate him for the rest of his days and beyond. He didn’t know which was the most dangerous. The worse was, to see the anger and the sadness in her eyes made him feel something he had never felt before - not when it came to the war they waged anyway. Guilt. Because this time, he knew she really deserved it more than he did. Of course, he would never confess that. And a faculty trip to Tokyo he had been planning for weeks was still involved, so part of him was very much eager to fight for it. But then…

 

She blinked several times as if to dry a tear or two and her knuckles whitened almost imperceptibly, fingers pressing hard against the wood.

  
  


“I’ve had a very shite morning, Doctor Smith,” she said with a dejected sigh before she let herself fall back down on her chair. “Please, just tell me it was you so I don’t have to believe a bloody email ruined the last chance I had of getting something out of this sodden university.”

  
  


He took off his glasses with one hand a fiddled with a corner of a page, doing his best not to look at her.

  
  


“No one received an email about this meeting, actually,” he started, carefully picking his words so it all wouldn’t end in a bloodbath. “It was decided at the half-term meeting three months ago. The meeting you couldn’t attend because you were on sick leave. But everyone else was there. For whatever reason, the President asked  _ me  _ to tell you about it, as if we’re mates or something, but I…. Forgot.”

“Forgot, or chose not to tell me just to rob me of the opportunity? Again?”

“I did want to tell you,” he assured her, hoping she would see the truth in his words. “I just… Wanted to wait a little so you’d have less time to prepare. You know you’ve always been better than me for this kind of stuff, and I thought it would be good to have a bit of a head start. And then, I really forgot.”

“So, you mean to tell me that during those three long months you’ve been working on your project, it didn’t occur to you just once that it would be good to, maybe, I don’t know, bloody tell me about it?” she stated much too calmly to his liking, her frustration obviously ramping up into the kind of quiet anger he knew didn’t bode well. “Tell you what, if you don’t want to play by the rules, then fine, we’ll both play by  _ my  _ rules.”

“How do you mean,  _ your  _ rules, Doctor Tyler?” he asked, shuffling nervously on his seat.

“Fear not, I am a woman of fairness and equality. Unlike you, it seems”

  
  


He watched, just a bit scared, as she rose from her chair and offered a mischievous smile he was quite sure wasn’t meant to be reassuring. She took a sip of her coffee, winking at him above the ridge of the cup, then slowly brought it up over his stack of copies.

  
  


“No reason why you can have notes when I don’t.”

  
  


He jumped from his chair with a loud shriek when he understood what her intention was, but it was too late. It was just a drip, at first, but a drip that turned into a steady stream splashing over the neat piles until it was swimming in a pool of hot coffee.

  
  


“Are you out of your mind?” he barked as he shoved her away, mindlessly wiping the top with the back of his sleeve. “I don’t have time to get more copies, you’ve just ruined half of my presentation, stupid woman!”

“And your suit,” she grinned, purposefully looking at the soaked deep blue material of his jacket. “Now, we all know Doctor Smith is useless without his notes, don’t we? All you ever do during your presentations is read. Boring. This will add some spice, won’t it?”

“I still have my slides, you won’t get away with this, Tyler!”

“Your slides? What slides?”

  
  


He looked up from the disastrous mess his papers had melted into and gasped, glancing down between his feet to make sure it wasn’t his computer case in her hands. He found out it was. She must have stolen it from him while he was busy trying to save bits and pieces of his notes - she hadn’t been wrong when she had said he was useless without his notes. So, if he didn’t get his computer back with his precious slides… He didn’t want to think about it.

  
  


“Doctor Tyler, this is my property and I demand you give it back, right now,” he ordered, pointing a threatening finger at her, a hard scowl spread over his features.

  
  


She simply raised an eyebrow, shoved the case inside a drawer, turned the key in the locket to secure it, and offered the key in the crook of her palm. Just as he was about to snatch it back from her, she threw it through her open window and faked a moan of apology.

  
  


“Oh, I’m sorry, Doctor, it appears I’ve lost the key,” she smiled, mockingly tugging on her drawer to make sure it was properly locked. “I’m afraid we don’t have enough time to look for it, you’ll have to do without it. But surely the brilliant Doctor Smith doesn’t need slides to convince the committee of the utmost importance of a trip to Backwater-Upon-Moron to learn more about, what was it, ass fissioning?”

“You’ll pay for this, Doctor Tyler,” he growled, a low rumble in his throat. “I spent hours and hours on this and you’ve just ruined all of it.”

“You ruined it all for me the moment you decided not to tell me,” she shot back, picking up the soaked papers to throw them in her bin. “That’s all you ever do, ruin my career, ruin my faculty, day after day, you just stand in my way and make sure nothing good ever happens to me! I’m tired of you and your bloody childish pride and ambitions!”

“They are not childish....”

“You want to wank at night,  _ oh yes, I’m so good at what I do, I’m the best, look at me, ‘m Mister Clever Scientist, king to the humanities peasants, _ ” she continued in a high-pitched voice, as if she hadn’t heard his interruption, “then please, wank away all you want, but don’t expect me to give you a hand. I’m going to this meeting, and I’ll give it my best shot just because I don’t want to make it easy for you. Now get the Hell away from here and tell the President I’ll be five minutes late.”

“You can tell him yourself, some ginormous head case told me I’m not good at delivering messages,” he muttered, kicking the chair back under the desk. “I meant it, by the way. I really wanted to tell you. You’d better give me my computer back after the meeting, Doctor Tyler.”

“Sure, just find the keys, Doctor Smith. Now go.”

“With pleasure. Nutter.”

  
  


He made sure to slam the door on his way out, before he leaned against it, a heavy sigh flowing out of his mouth. She made sure to throw her empty cup of coffee at the door, before she leaned back in her chair, a tired moan flowing out of her mouth. Well, at least, neither of them would get what they wanted at that meeting, he believed. And, well, at least, both of them would make a poor impression on the committee, she believed.

 

He pondered for a moment if he ought to go at all. No notes, no slides, mouth full of anger and head full of resentment. No use in going. And Doctor Tyler was right, anyway. She deserved that budget more than he did. She was right. He should have played fair and square from the beginning, told her about the meeting and give her a chance, just like everyone else had, but he hadn’t. Because of him, she wouldn’t get her chance to go to Milan with her students, just like she hadn’t gotten her chance to get a few lousy books. He understood why she hated him. And she was right to.

 

Instead of taking the elevator to the conference room, he kept walking towards his office. That was a battle he didn’t want to fight, much less to win.

 

She pondered for a moment if she ought to go at all. No notes, no slides, blood boiling with frustration and head full of furious thoughts. No use in going. And Doctor Smith would go anyway. Even without his stuff, she knew he would be better than she could ever be. She had nothing. If he had played fair and square, she would have had her chances, she could have presented something worth at least part of that budget, but he hadn't. Because of him, she wouldn’t get her chance to o to Milan with her students, or anywhere else for that matter. Just like she hadn’t gotten her chance to get a few books and a modicum of money to revamp the department. She wanted to hate him, but she couldn’t. She could blame him for not telling her about the meeting, but she knew he hadn’t lied, and just forgotten. Just another vile trick that had turned sour. And she had ruined his chances, too. He had worked hard for this, and she had destroyed all of it. She understood why he was angry. And he was right to.

 

Instead of preparing a sketch of ideas she could present at the meeting, she crossed her arms over her desk and buried her face in the crook of an elbow. That was a battle she didn’t want to fight, much less to win.

 

* * *

 


	5. Hatchet

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I told you this story would be no more than 10 chapters, and I think I'm going to do just that - which is too rare an occurrence not to mention it.  
> It will definitely be E-rated by the time this is completed, BTW (after all this tension we'll deserve it, right?)
> 
>  
> 
> I hope you'll like it, thank you for reading!

* * *

 

 

Maybe he had gone too far, this time. He had never meant for what was supposed to be a childish war to turn so sour, so quickly. Oh, he had never really considered her as an enemy. He liked her, even. A lot. She was clever and witty and fierce. He thought she rather liked him, too, despite her taunts and her plans to make his life miserable. They were… Kind of frenemies, he supposed. They had always had moments when they would just talk without wanting to bring each other down, tease without wanting to hurt each other deep. He enjoyed those moments. Even when she sent him emails about his choice of underwear or commented on his poor grammar. It was fun. 

 

But with what had happened earlier that day, he thought things had taken a sharp turn in the wrong direction. Many times, he had wanted to invite her for a drink, or to dinner, or to the cinema, just to see what would happen, and how they would actually be around each other in a context other than the university. But he never had. And now, he thought he would never get the chance to ask her out. Ever. He had mucked everything up - quite unintentionally, he had to remind himself - and he had lost to the last thread of the semblance of friendship she had given him. Still, couldn’t hurt to try and fix it. If she cracked his skull open with her heel, he would know there’d be no point in giving it a second try.

 

He kicked on her door with the tip of his polished shoe, once, twice, thrice, and her tired voice filtered through.

  
  


“Come in,” she called out - and was that a heavy sigh that followed? Not good.

“Um, it’s me, the door’s closed, can’t come in,” he said loudly, banging his forehead against the wood when he tried to get closer , probably too close.

“No it’s not, I didn’t lock it,” she answered just as loudly with something akin to annoyance in her voice.

“Maybe not, but it’s closed,” he repeated. He winced when he heard her grumble and mentally prepared himself for the smack on the head she would greet him with.

“Just pull on the bloody handle, moron, it’s unlocked!” she almost shouted before she slammed her hands on her desk - at least, that’s what it sounded like, and he hoped she wouldn’t slam them anywhere near him.

“I’d love to do that, Doctor Tyler, but I’ve got my hands full, you see, and I can’t come in, whether it is unlocked or not.”

  
  


He heard some shuffling coming from inside her office, a curse, a litany of mumbles he was quite certain weren’t praises, and the door barely opened. Well, that was to be expected. She didn’t want to see him. He would have to be very careful and treat her like a lit stick of dynamite, find a way to wet the wick and avoid any unwanted explosion. He pushed the door open with his foot and saw she was already back at her desk, muttering at her screen and royally ignoring him. 

 

He cleared his throat, put a mug of steaming coffee next to her keyboard, another one on the edge of the desk so he wouldn’t get too close to her personal sphere, and carefully sat down on the chair.

  
  


“What do you want?” she asked without looking at him, quite cold - well, the current atmosphere was more of a blizzard than a simple breeze, so maybe  _ cold  _ didn’t quite fit.

“I, uh,” he started, carefully picking his words so he wouldn’t spark the explosion by accident. “When I invited you for a coffee two weeks ago, this isn’t exactly what I had in mind, you know.”

  
  


He looked down at the coffee stains marring the white surface of her desk, which she obviously hadn’t deemed necessary to clean after pouring half a cup over it. She didn’t react, so he raised his eyebrows with a sheepish smile, and pushed her mug closer to her with a fingertip. 

  
  


“So, I brought you some coffee.”

“I’ve had enough coffee this morning, thanks,” she simply answered, starting to type on her computer.

“I got you the mug with Shakespeare on it, though,” he pointed out. “Look, he’s got a cap, and it says  _ madcap _ . I thought you’d like the pun.”

  
  


He saw the way the corner of her lips twitched and he knew he was treading on the right path - nothing better than the Bard to appeal to a literature geek and gain their favour.

  
  


“I don’t want any coffee,  _ though _ ,” she parroted the last word to mock the awkward pitch of his voice. “I could always pour it over your crotch, if you really want me to do something with it. Nothing would make me happier, but I doubt it will be pleasant for you. The wanker you are can’t possibly do without his penis, can he?”

“I didn’t come to give you a stupid mug with crap coffee, nor did I come to talk about my penis, Doctor Tyler,” he huffed before he sipped on his own mug, hiding his grimace of pain when the boiling liquid burnt his tongue with a scowl.

“Fine, then what? What is it you want? Haven’t you ruined my day enough, did you come to tell me you got the budget for Backwater-Upon-Moron or brag some more about your toy?”

  
  


The more she talked, the redder her cheeks turned, the darker her eyes grew, the shallower her breath came out. Definitely not a good sign. Maybe she would really explode, no matter what he’d say.

  
  


“Or come to tell me that the whole of my faculty is useless, that giving me a hundred pounds to get bloody books was a waste of money you could have spent on mushrooms? That my faculty is going to be closed down because no one cares about humanities anyway, so why not make this university the bloody Church of sciences? Or that…”

“I came to apologize, alright?” he interrupted through a desperate shout before she could go any further, before she wouldn’t have been able to hear him over her rant. “I know the President treats you and your faculty like shit, and all I can do is make it worse. I’m sorry, okay? I didn’t go to the meeting this morning, because I thought you deserved this budget more than I did. And I really meant to tell you about it, by the way, no matter what you may think. I’m really sorry I forgot, but you’re not the only head of faculty here, I’ve got tons of shit on my desk every morning, too, and I did this bloody presentation head up in my arse whenever I wasn’t falling asleep on my desk at night, so excuse-me if I didn’t think about telling you, because I could barely think of doing it myself.”

  
  


He was quite sure his cheeks were as red as hers now, but at least that vehement outburst had caught her attention. She looked at him for a second, without a smile, without a word, without any expression other than a blasé blink. But then she took the mug he had offered and took a small sip. That was a good sign. Or so he believed. It had to be.

 

He watched, hands crossed over her desk to hide their trembling, as she pulled her drawer open, pulled out his computer case, handed it to him.

  
  


“Sorry I ruined your presentation,” she shrugged - and God, was he happy to see her shoulders relax and her mouth stir into a sketch of a grin. “That was unfair, I shouldn’t have done that. I was just angry, but that’s not an excuse. I know you didn’t go to the meeting because of me, and I’m sorry about that, too.”

“How come you know that?” he frowned, slipping his case between his feet.

“‘Cause I printed your presentation and went to give you your computer and your notes back, but you weren’t there,” she said as she pulled out a stack of paper from another drawer. 

“You did?” 

 

He gaped a little at the sheepish admission, but was quick to close his mouth when she stared at his lips for just a tad too long.

  
  


“It was a good presentation, Doctor Smith, I would have given you the budget. I’m sorry you didn’t get to present your project.”

“Well, to be perfectly honest, I don’t even know if I’d have had enough time to go on such a trip, so, all in all, maybe it’s not a bad thing,” he laughed, releasing a shaky sigh of relief when she giggled alongside him. “You could have, though. Been to Milan, for your Latin stuff.”

“Are you implying I don’t work enough, Doctor Smith? That I have so much spare time I could go on trips whenever I feel like it?”

“What? ‘Course not, I’d never…”

“Joking, Smith, don’t get your blue panties in a wad again,” she teased - quite against his best judgment, he looked down at his fly, just in case it was unzipped again. Of course, she laughed even louder when he realized it was perfectly zipped up. “Got you.”

“Haha, very funny, Doctor Tyler,” he mumbled, though his grin betrayed his lightheartedness. “Look, how about he bury the hatchet for a while?”

“Hm, agreed,” she nodded. 

  
  


She reached into her large purse and took out a small plastic box filled to the brim with biscuits. 

  
  


“Have one, it’s on me. And yes, I made them, and no, they are not poisonous. Mind you, I did it once. Almost gave you cookies sprinkled with laxatives, but I thought that was too evil.”

“Good thing I never made you drink my, er, special coffee, then,” he winked, stuffing a biscuit in his mouth. “Basically, filtered mould. Nothing harmful, but it tastes like… Well, you don’t want to know how it tastes like, really.”

  
  


She shook her head with a grin and dipped her own biscuit in her coffee, staring at him with eyes that had him shift uncomfortable in his seat. Odd, how the mood had shifted. Odd, but terribly nice. He had thought he liked it when she was pinning him with a pair of furious whiskey eyes, but he realized he enjoyed it even more when she was enveloping him in a soft, almost fond look. She was hot and sexy when she was angry, but like this, she simply was beautiful. 

 

He blinked out of his momentary trance when she offered another biscuit, and he suddenly remembered he had something of his own to give to her.

  
  


“Oh, before I forget,” he said between mouthfuls, handing her the heavy book he had kept on the side. “Got you your book. In English, this time, I thought it would make it easier for everyone. Peace offering, yeah?”

“You didn’t have to, John, seriously,” she sighed as she picked it up from his hand - she remained oblivious to the sudden blush that swallowed his face at the use of his name. “But thanks, that’s really nice of you. I’ll give you the French one back, maybe you can get a refund?”

“Nah, keep it for you collection,” he managed to say after clearing his throat several times. “Well, I uh, should probably go, you know, set everything up for my next chemistry lessons and… Stuff. Nice talking to you, though, and thanks for the biscuits, they’re fab.”

“Thanks for the coffee and the book,” she smiled back as she pulled herself out of her chair to lead him back to the door. “We’ll catch up later, yeah?”

“Sure, I… I’ll see you later, then. Have a nice day, Doctor Tyler.”

“And you, Doctor Smith.”

  
  


When the door was closed behind him, she stared at it for long minutes and wondered what had just happened with him. She didn’t know he stayed standing behind the same door for long minutes, wondering what had just happened with her.

 

She eventually walked back to her desk, a huge grin plastered over her face. John Smith had definitely tried to hit on her.

 

He eventually walked back to his office, his heart thumping loud and hard against his chest. Rose Tyler has definitely tried to hit on him.

 

* * *

 


	6. Lilac

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone!
> 
> New chapter for this silly little story!  
> Things are starting to really move forward, and it makes me kinda happy!
> 
> I hope you'll like it!

* * *

 

 

He stared at the small vial sitting on his desk and he let his hands hover over his keyboard. All it would take was one finger pressing down on one key. Maybe it was too soon. It had just been a week since they’d made peace. Well, peace. She had threatened to kill him only once in seven days, so that was an improvement. A formidable improvement, even. Improvement enough to call their current relationship peaceful. To be fair, it wasn’t his fault chemicals had exploded in the room in which he was supposed to give a class. Not anymore than being delocalized to one of her rooms was. 

 

Of course, there had been a mix-up and she had been furious to find her room occupied, with nowhere else to go to talk about her rubbish Latin - or whatever her lesson was about. Not his fault. But she still had thrown a tantrum - he  _ loved  _ her tantrums - and sworn she would get his head. Maybe she wouldn’t have, if he hadn’t thrown a board pen at her face and told her to sod off. Still, not his fault. Not really. 

 

He read the email he had written again, looked at the vial again. Maybe she had already forgotten about the incident. And if she hadn’t, well, that could be a good apology gift. He had planned for this vial to mean something else, but desperate times call for desperate measures, he supposed. He wasn’t desperate, per se, but but he couldn’t deny he would love to spend more quality time with her, no board pens and death threats involved.

 

He looked at his vial one last time and hit the key. Come what may. 

  
  


_ Would you like to eat me at the canteen in half an hour? I have something nice to give you and I’m quite sure you’ll like it. Dr Smith _

  
  


She grinned at the message that popped open on her screen and stifled a snort.  After what had happened two days before, she was sure he must have spent at least an hour writing this and an hour more pondering whether he should send it at all. She knew him so well, it almost scared her. But she also knew herself, and she knew there was no way she could let that opportunity to tease him fly by. How he had missed the mistake after reading the sentence a hundred times, she didn’t know. But he had missed it.

  
  


_ That’s a bold offer from someone who owes me an apology. But okay, we can try to hide behind your plant, second row on the left. Hope you won’t be as loud as you were on Wednesday, though. See you there. Dr Tyler _

  
  


He blinked as he read her answer. Definitely not what he had expected. He had ranked  _ no answer _ in his list of possibilities first.  _ Sod off _ , second.  _ No _ , third. A sexually connoted joke about a single missing word, now, that had come last. Hadn’t come at all, if he was honest with himself. 

 

He tried to rub his blush from his cheeks and tried to think of an answer. He could shrug it off as a ridiculous mistake, or he could taunt her about her lack of inventiveness. Or he could keep the joke going - give her something she wouldn’t expect either. He knew it wasn’t a good idea, because he was enjoying it too much, and not in the proper way. He had this image of Doctor Tyler floating around his thoughts, and he knew indulging in dirty jokes of the kind wouldn’t do wonders to his infatuation. Still, maybe that was an open door he could walk through. 

 

Maybe she was trying to seduce him. After all, she did seem to fixate a lot on his attributes. He could only hope she wasn’t interested in said attributes alone and that he had something to do with it - if she was interested at all, that might just have been hazardous interpretation on his side.

 

He grinned at his screen and typed an answer. If she was trying to seduce him with her jokes, no reason why he couldn’t do the same. If it was just a silly game she liked, it could not hurt much more than feelings he wasn’t sure he even felt. If it meant more to her, well, playing along could make her understand he was interested, too.

  
  


_ If I get too loud, science room B47 is soundproof. And I’m the only one to have the keys. Dr Smith _

  
  


This time, she couldn’t help the laugh that rose in her throat. She couldn’t help the blush that rose on her cheeks either. She realized she didn’t know him as well as she had first believed. He could be bold. Bold and funny. She knew she liked him - when he wasn’t making her life a living Hell - but this… This was a side of him she had never really seen before. She liked it. Really liked it. She wondered if he had meant something more than a simple taunt, sending this message. It was unusual, coming from him. The ever serious Doctor she had rarely seen laugh or smile - probably because when they met it was to jump at each other’s throats and scream, most of the times. She had always thought he was much too different from her to consider hanging out with him, but maybe she had been wrong. Maybe she could actually enjoy his company.

 

She typed her answer, sent it, and turned off her computer.

  
  


_ Good to know. Maybe the science department does have a few perks. See you. Dr Tyler _

  
  


He smirked at the message, turned off his computer and snatched his lunch box in his bag before he hurried to the canteen. He didn’t know if he could consider this impromptu meeting a date, but it sure felt like it to him. Share a lunch with his favorite Doctor. He even had a gift. Oh, he couldn’t wait to see her face when he’d tell her what is was. The face she’d make would be his answer. He hoped. Hoped she would smile and thank him and maybe take his hand and kiss his cheek. He could only hope.

 

He spotted her immediately behind the large plant, on the small table meant for two, and he realized she had really known about this table all along. He was horrified that she had probably seen him spy on her on several occasions, but he simply couldn’t point it out, lest he’d spontaneously combust. Better to play it casual. Casual was good.

  
  


“Nice spot, isn’t it?” he beamed at her as he dropped his lunch box on the table and plopped down on the plastic chair. 

“Doctor Smith,” she greeted around a chip she was nibbling. “Nice spot indeed, I wondered what was so good about it you spent half a lifetime behind that plant. D’you mind if I finish my chicken before I eat you?”

  
  


His fork bounced on the tiled floor, and he was quite sure his face reappeared from under the table redder than it had ever been. If she dared make such comments face to face, not hidden behind a computer screen, he doubted his composure would survive. He doubted  _ he  _ would survive.

  
  


“I, huh, I mean, please, do,” he stuttered, flipping the lead of his box open with shaky hands. “That’s not the reason why I asked you…”

“Out?” she grinned at his blush and the way he stabbed a tomato. “Well, I say out… I just had to cross two corridors. Inside.”

“I asked you for lunch,” he hurried to correct, stuffing a salad leaf into his mouth. “That’s not the kind of place I would take a woman on a date, Doctor Tyler.”

“Oh, and where would you take her, then?”

“Dunno. B47?”

  
  


He instantly regretted the squeak - because it most definitely didn’t sound like a letter and two numbers - that fell from his lips and looked down at the content of his box, suddenly fascinated by the shape of a piece of cheese. 

  
  


“Of course, where was my head,” she laughed, gently kicking his shin under the table. “So, you mentioned a gift?”

“Hm, quite right.” he nodded, glad she was the one to take the conversation to safer territories - if there ever was a safe territory with that woman at all.

  
  


He reached into his pocket and took out his precious vial, carefully putting it down next to her plate. She picked it up, examined the brownish liquid with a suspicious eye.

  
  


“Go on, open it,” he urged between bites. 

“Is that another one of your horrible jokes?” she couldn’t help asking, not really reassured by its colour. “It’s not diluted mice crap or fermented piss?”

“You have an awfully vulgar vocab for someone of your stature, Doctor Tyler,” he grinned, wiping the corners of his mouth with his napkin - if she did want to kiss him on the cheek, he wanted to be sure she wouldn’t hesitate because of a bit of salad or a drip of vinegar. “But no, I promise it isn’t. Just smell it, will you?”

“If I puke, I swear I’m doing it in your lunchbox,” she warned, flicking the lid open with her thumb.

  
  


She brought the vial to her nose, not really knowing what to do with the grin plastered all  over his daft face, and she took a sniff. Her eyes widened at the smell of it, and his grin bloomed into a full-blown beam.

  
  


“Damn, that smells nice,” she acknowledged, running a finger on the opening to gather the fragrance on her fingertip. “Where did you get that?”

“Homemade perfume,” he announced proudly - though she would have expected a smugness way beyond the limits of common decency, he looked merely pleased, which she found rather impressive and maybe just a bit charming. “I noticed how you liked yours, so I made some research and… Tada!”

“What’s in this?” she asked, taking another long inhale of the sweet smell.

“Lilac, blueberries and, sorry to say, roses. Took me over two months to find the perfect balance between the three and find out how long I needed to centrifuge the ingredients to get the adequate fragrance potency. Do you like it, then?”

“I do, I really do, this is amazing, John. But why? I mean, I really appreciate the gesture, I’m just wondering why you’d go the trouble at all.”

“I’m… Good with dates?”

“Dates, as in…?”

“As in today is the twenty-third of March, and it’s been precisely five years since we started working together. That was my first day in this university, and you were the only one who bothered to show me around. You helped me settle in, you answered all my questions, and you even said…”

“Better to have a hot science geek as a neighbour than a decaying bald dinosaur,” she finished for him with a smile. “Yeah, I remember that.”

“And I never really thanked you for your help, so I thought… You know, small gift. It’s not much, and I think I’ll need a thousand bottles more of this to properly make up for everything I put you through, but it’s a start isn’t it?”

  
  


She chuckled at his embarrassed shrug, rose from her chair and her hand landed in a friendly hold on the side of his neck. 

  
  


“Thank you”, she said softly after she pressed a quick kiss much too close to his mouth.

“Well, thank you.”

  
  


How his  _ you’re welcome _ had turned into a  _ thank you _ and made him feel like a proper arse, he didn’t know. Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to let Doctor Tyler’s lips anywhere near him, in the end. 

 

* * *

 


	7. Hardware

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, that's it, hope you're ready for it! :)
> 
> I'll write one more chapter after this one, and I think I'll be done with this little story!
> 
> I hope you'll enjoy it!

* * *

 

 

_ Would you mind coming over, I need your help. Thanks. Doctor Tyler _

  
  


She hadn’t quite meant to send that message. She had typed it because she was bored, and being bored, the only thing she could think of was him. The delicious perfume she had sprayed on her neck didn’t help much with her predicament. She had always refused to dwell on her light attraction because she had always refused to acknowledge she was attracted to an insufferable smartass. But now, she knew he could be nice. Kind and funny. That, coupled with his handsome face and magnificent backside made it just a tad harder to resist. It wasn’t wise to let herself fall for a colleague, because she had seen many relationships of the kind end in complete disasters and she didn’t want to ruin the cordial friendship they had been building over the past few weeks. They had shared more coffees, more biscuits, more lunches behind his plant in the canteen, and she had loved every minute they had spent together. It all made her long for more - and if she wasn’t mistaken, he wanted the exact same thing. They just didn’t want to take that step forward. After five years spent in perpetual conflict, she supposed it was only normal to hesitate. 

 

The message bell chimed and a small message popped up in the corner of her screen.

  
  


_ You alright? _

  
  


Well, if she wanted to read something that wasn’t there, she would definitely read genuine concern in that message. Short, clear, no joke, no signature - very unlike him, not to taunt her about needing his help. 

  
  


_ Sure, just some IT stuff, can’t connect to the Internet and Wilf is not answering. Thought you’d know how to fix it. It can wait though, don’t worry. _

 

_ Not busy right now, I’m coming. Hope you’ve got a few of those biscuits left. Be there in a tick _ .

  
  


“Shit,” she cursed at her screen - because of course, the connection was doing just fine, so she’d either have to play dumber than he thought she already was, or confess it had just been a trick to invite him without sounding too desperate. “Well, needs must.”

  
  


She pushed her chair away from the desk, crawled under it and pulled hard on a cable to severe the connection. If he came to fix, might as well give him something to actually fix, she believed. Just as she sat back on her chair and faked an annoyed look at her screen as she pretended to click repeatedly in frustration, he appeared on her doorstep with a pot of coffee in one hand and a pair of mugs in the other.

  
  


“Hiya,” he greeted with a smile, setting it all down on her desk. “Smith to the rescue, Doctor Tyler, freshly brewed coffee is just a bonus. So, what’s wrong then?”

“Dunno,” she shrugged, rolling her chair to the side to give him access to her screen. “It just stopped working all of the sudden, I don’t know why.”

“Did you check the cables?” he asked as he slipped his glasses on the tip of his nose. “They can get a bit loose after a while, maybe it’s just unplugged.”

“Uh, no,” she answered with a sheepish nip on her lip - damn it, now she really felt stupid.

“That’s alright, no worries. Here, move aside, I’ll have a look.”

  
  


She didn’t get to protest. He pushed her chair to the side and fell on his knees, crawling under the desk like she had done a mere minute before. Well. She supposed the view could be worse. She didn’t mean to stare, but the pinstriped trousers pulled taut over his glorious arse made it hard to look away. 

  
  


“It’s the cable,” he told her from under the desk - and God, did he really have to curve the small of his back like that? “The plastic bit’s broken, it can’t stay plugged in. How did that happen?”

“Must be the cleaning lady, she moves stuff around in my office all the time,” she shrugged even though she hated blame someone innocent. “Can you fix it, then?”

“We just need to change the cable,” he said as he emerged from under the desk with a smile.

  
  


She bit the inside of her cheek when he used her thigh to push himself up, digging his long fingers deep into her skin. It might not have been the best idea to pick a short skirt in her wardrobe that morning. Had he noticed? He certainly was blushing. And trying hard not to look at her with his eyes that had considerably widened. Maybe it had actually  _ been  _ the best idea. 

  
  


“What have you seen under that desk, Doctor Smith?” she teased with a tongue-touched grin, making sure to cross her legs when he finally dared to look at her.

“ _ Possibilities _ ,” he said in a tone that wanted to be outrageous, just to see the same blush on her rosy cheeks - he wasn’t about to let her ostentatiously taunt him without fighting back, it seemed.

“Did you, now?”

“Oh, yes,” he nodded, darting out his tongue to moisturize his lip. “Lots of space under that desk. We could, hm, probably fit a new WiFi terminal.”

“Could you fit an external hard drive, too?” she asked, poking her tongue between her teeth, innocently fluttering her eyelashes.

“Definitely, you have the right port,” he continued, obviously not intent on losing this brawl of innuendos. “I think I have one I don’t use much in my office, FAT formatted, couple of terabytes.”

“Sounds a bit arrogant if you ask me,” she grinned - oh, it wasn’t wise to keep this kind of game going, and she perfectly knew it. There was just something about his smile and his teeth biting into that pouty lip that made it hard to stop.

“I could just give you a few USB sticks, if you so wish,” he winked with a filthy smirk, pretending to wipe his lip with his finger. “Not as good, but if you’re not too demanding, they should do nicely.”

“Yeah, we could start there. Take your hard drive too, though, just in case.”

“Of course, sure. So, shall we pick a  _ date _ , Doctor Tyler?”

  
  


She noticed the emphasis he put on the word date, and if she wasn’t mistaken, he was talking about going on an actual date with her. That was it. After several weeks of tension and seduction, he had finally made a move in that direction. She probably should have broken that cable ages ago, and she regretted it had taken her so long to realize he was just as interested as she was. And after that conversation that had led her to daydream about his hard drive and his USB sticks, she almost wanted to pretend they had been dating long enough to indulge in one or two fantasies that involved the very desk he was leaning against. 

  
  


“Rose?” he insisted when she stared at his lips for a second too long.

“Right, yes, how about next Wednesday?” she offered, pretending to look at her faculty schedule hanging on her wall. “Not a big day, I can find a few hours.”

“Oh, that day’s rather busy for me,” he faked a sad frown, shaking his head. “I’m afraid I’ll only be free at eight, would that be too late?”

“Not at all, eight sounds good,” she smiled as he blew a relieved sigh through his nose. “It shouldn’t take too long to set it up anyway.”

“Set it up?” he asked with a raised eyebrow - obviously he had lost track of the initial purpose of the date, and that only made her giggle louder.

“The WiFi terminal, Doctor Smith. You know, broken cable, no Internet, all that.”

“Ah, quite right,” he laughed just a tad sheepishly, running fingers through his mane. “No, it’ll only take a few minutes. I was just hoping we, uh, might, don’t know, maybe…”

“Go out? Yeah, I got the clue, thank you Doctor Smith. ”

“Right, yes, good, that’s… Good. So, um, coffee?”

“Wouldn’t you rather like a refreshment?” she suggested as she popped just enough button on her blouse to reveal an impressive cleavage that didn’t leave much to his imagination. “I’m rather hot and I’d like something cold.”

“Hot, yes, indeed,” he nodded with pinched lips - she smirked at how his eyes struggled not to look anywhere under her clavicles. “Right, shall we go to the cafeteria, then? It’s still open.”

“Alright. Shall I lead the way, Doctor Smith?”

“Oh, I’d rather I did, if you don’t mind.”

“Why would that be?”

“‘Cause that hardware of yours tends to cause my hard drive to overheat. It hasn’t been plugged in any port for a while, and, well, I’m scared it’s gonna start acting up.”

“Nice one,” she complimented with a smirk before she bent over to pick up her bag. “Come on Smith, let’s go before those metaphors get out of control and we need to reschedule our relationship update to today.”

“We’re all running on Windows around here, that wouldn’t be the first time an unplanned update happens,” he shrugged, wiggling his eyebrows, winking at her above the rim of his glasses. 

“Let me restart my system with an iced tea first, will you?”

“Of course. Hm, just to be clear, those were all metaphors for…”

“Sex, Doctor Smith, I don’t actually care much about computers and all that geek stuff.”

  
  


He laughed a breathy laugh at those words and cupped her cheeks in his hands, before he planted a quick, soft kiss on her lips.

  
  


“Okay, then I want you to know, I like your software just as much as I like your hardware,” he admitted, hoping she was enough of a geek to understand that last metaphor. “Your code is hard to crack, but I love a good challenge, Doctor Tyler.”

  
  


She gaped at him for a moment, quite unable to believe the Doctor Smith had just confessed he actually liked her and, God, kissed her, and could he do that again without the absurd figure of speech?

  
  


“That’s, um, an unexpectedly sweet compliment, Doctor Smith,” she smiled a quivering smile, taking the hand he offered. “Thank you. And just to be clear, I’m interested in more than just your hardware, too.”

“Good to know,” he grinned as he tucked a strand of blond hair behind her ear. “Come on, Rose, let’s get your tea. And, for the record, you can call me anytime you need me for geek stuff.”

 

* * *

 


	8. Proofreading

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, finally, here goes another chapter for this silly little story!
> 
> One more chapter to go, and it'll be completed!
> 
> I hope you'll enjoy it, thanks for reading!

* * *

 

 

He was going on a date with Doctor Tyler.

 

The plastic soles of his shoes squeaked on the linoleum of the corridor, sounding too loud in the deserted university. He should have picked other shoes. Maybe she expected him to wear leather, polished shoes, not those worn chucks he had barely managed to clean properly. Would she notice? Would she think he hadn’t put any effort into picking up his clothes? Think he didn’t believe she was worth the efforts? God, he should have picked other shoes. And other flowers, as well. Roses. He had bought bloody roses for a woman whose name was Rose. His only comfort was that said roses were free of any thorns, so if she decided to throw them at his face, he would remain mostly unscathed. That was if she decided not to strangle him with the ethernet cable he had brought along. As a gift, or as a joke, he couldn’t even remember. All he could think about was that lingering feeling she was about to admit it had been another one of her pranks. He usually wasn’t one to doubt people’s intentions, but with Rose, it was different. He doubted because he cared. Quite a lot.

 

The door to her office appeared at the corner of the corridor, half-open, shedding a bright light that guided him like a beacon. If he made a metaphor about doors to Heaven, would she think he was trying too hard? It did sound lame, even to his neophyte’s ears. Probably better to leave metaphors out of the equation, he decided. 

 

He cleared his throat, readjusted the knot of his tie, made sure his fly was properly pulled up. And he knocked. No second-guessing, no thinking about what to say, or what to do. If he started thinking, he knew he would remain standing behind that door like a lamp until his bunch of flowers withered and turned to a bundle of firewood.

  
  


“Come in, John!” she called out from inside - and he frowned a little at how anxious she sounded.

“Hello, Rose,” he greeted as he stepped into the tiny office, spotting her behind her screen, frantically typing on her keyboard. “How are you?”

“Fucked,” she answered without a single glance at him. “So fucked.”

“What happened?”

“What happened is I bloody forgot to proofread a bunch of theses I’m supposed to send back to my students tomorrow. One thousand pages littered with typos and grammar and spelling mistakes I need to go over. Please put me out of my misery and tell me I’m fucked.”

  
  


John sighed softly, put his flowers and his cable down on her desk. He wasn't even surprised. Not really. Awfully disappointed, terribly dejected, but not surprised. He had thought about it. About the possibility she would find an excuse not to go out with him. About how this was all just a prank. She didn’t like him, she didn’t want to date him, and he had been gullible enough, infatuated enough to walk straight into the trap she had set. 

  
  


“It’s alright, Rose, you can drop the act,” he sighed with a small shrug, shoving his hands in his pockets. “But just so you know, that was really cruel.”

  
  


She suddenly stopped typing and looked away from her screen to gift him with a pair of wide eyes and a gaping mouth.

  
  


“What the Hell are you on about?” she asked, obviously confused by his barely hidden resentment. “John, seriously, what?”

“I fell for your joke, well done,” he huffed - somehow, the fact that she seemed intent on keeping the whole joke going annoyed him a lot more than the joke itself. “Haha, that was well played, one point to Doctor Tyler. But guess what, I’m done playing your stupid games. I’m done with all of it. It might be fun to you to use my feelings against me, but just so you know, that one really hurts.”

“John, whatever you think I did, I didn’t,” she protested with all the vehemence she could muster.

“You didn’t plan to miraculously have something better to do than go out with me? You didn’t plan to tell me I’m just a massive dumbass to believe you could ever be interested in me? No?”

“No, of course not! God's sake, John, don’t blame me for your silly insecurities! The only thing I planned for tonight was to actually go out with you, because I am bloody interested, and to be honest, I thought you’d be the one not showing up and sending me a text to tell me rats had been set free in your asylum and you’d have to see to it or something!”

“Oh, really?” he chuckled, a laugh that greatly contrasted with the way he squinted his eyes..

  
  


Just as he plopped down on a chair, she rose from hers and took a step to the side, spreading her arms so he could see.

  
  


“I squeezed into a dress I haven’t worn for a decade and that’s too small now, I bought bloody heels that kill me feet, I went to the hairdresser, and I used your perfume,” she told him, feeling just a tad ridiculous to stand there in an outfit that was neither comfortable, nor quite to her liking. “And you wanna something, John bloody Smith? I did those stupid things for you. Just ‘cause I thought you’d like it. Just ‘cause I wanted to seduce you. Now that I see you’re incapable to trust me, I can’t help but wonder why I even…”

  
  


The rest of her sentence got lost in the growl that grew in her throat and she bent forward to take off a heel - tear it off her foot, rather. It only was when she threw the shoe at his face with a scowl that John reacted to her outburst, after watching her without doing much more than admire that face he adored when she was all flustered and angry. He jumped to his feet and caught her wrist, stopping her hand that was ready to throw the second heel, and carefully took it away to set it down on the chair. 

  
  


“You look stunning in that dress,” he finally told her - he would have added sexy, hot, and a bunch of other adjectives to qualify the way that short black dress hugged her curves, but he not unwisely decided it would be better to keep them for later. “You look beautiful, Rose. You don’t seduce me, though.”

“Oh, well that’s perfect then, thanks for that,” she huffed, swatting his fingers away from her wrist. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ll change into my sweatpants.”

“No, Rose, I meant… You can’t seduce me now, because you seduced me ages ago. If I’d had the balls, I would have asked you out the day I first arrived here. You don’t need to seduce me. That doesn’t mean it wasn’t worth the effort. You’re sublime, Doctor Tyler. I love it.”

“Oh… Well, thank you, then, that’s… Really nice of you,” she stuttered a little, the unexpected compliment soothing her anger into a much lighter annoyance. “You’re rather handsome yourself, you know. I’m… Really sorry, John, I promise I didn’t forget on purpose, just to play with your nerves.”

“Yeah, I’ve gathered,” he chuckled, taking her hands to run gentle thumbs in the crook of her palms. “Look, how about I go get my laptop and we work on that together? I might not speak Latin, but I do speak English. I could help, yeah?”

“I can’t ask you that, John, that’s not why you came,” she sighed - though he saw in her face she was actually dying to say yes. “That would be quite the crap date, wouldn’t it?”

“Of course it wouldn’t, I’ve always wanted to spend a whole date quoting Molière and talking in Latin proverbs,” he teased with a grin, tucking a stray strand of blond hair behind her ear. “And  a date with you is always a good date, anyway. Go on, then, get your files ready, I’ll be back in a tick.”

  
  


He cupped her cheek to plant a quick kiss on her lips, and almost danced out of the office with a goofy smile plastered over his face. Well. That could have gone worse, she supposed. Not only he didn’t seem annoyed in the least to have to postpone their date, he had also offered to spend what would be a long night, stuck with her in her tiny office to proofread papers he couldn’t care less about. God, she wanted to say she loved him. If she needed proof he really wanted to be more than simple colleagues with her, there it was. And he had kissed her, as if it’d been only natural, as if there was no doubt in his mind they already were together. Sort of. Maybe they were. They probably were. They had already kissed once, the week before, after all. That had to mean something, coming from the pair of them. Two Doctors too stupid to deserve their titles, too clueless to realize they’d been pining for each other for years. 

 

She shook her head with a smile, unable to feel anything else but thrilled she was going to spend a whole evening in his company despite the mountains of work waiting for them. She sat behind her computer and ordered the few files they would need to go through, making sure to gather the easiest ones for him - after all, he didn’t know how to spell  _ subaquatic _ , it might not have been quite reasonable to leave him with a whole dissertation about the use of Latin in modern sciences, no matter how good he was with said sciences. 

  
  


“What’s that smile about?” she heard him say from the door.

  
  


She looked up to him with an even brighter smirk and simply shrugged. No need to bring back the rather awful memory. He set his computer case down on the desk, search a pocket to take out a USB key, another pocket to take out his glasses, and finally reached into the inside of his jacket to fish a half-full bottle of bourbon.

  
  


“When we talked about me bringing my USB keys, this isn’t exactly what I had in mind,” he teased with a wiggle of his eyebrows, handing her the key she was quick to plug into her computer.

“That’s not what I had in mind either, if that’s any consolation,” she lamented - she hoped he didn’t notice her eyes darting to his slender fingers drumming his keyboard.

“Well, at least my hard drive won’t overheat, right? So, what do I start with, then?”

“Influence of 18th century French poetry on modern drama, if that’s okay with you.”

“Très bien, madame,” he answered with a nod and an exaggeratedly smart pout, brushing imaginary dust off the lapel of his jacket. “And just so you know, that was the extent of my French.”

“Don’t worry, it’s all in English and the French part don’t need to be proofread.”

“Well, Amen to that. Oh, listen to me, speaking Latin again! You’re impressed, aren’t you?”

“It’s actually Hebrew, John.”

“And that’s why I brought liquid courage,” he sighed, uncorking the bottle to pour himself a small quantity of the liquor in a mug. “Want some?”

“The point is to correct these papers, John, not add any more mistakes,” she pointed out - and he pushed his mug away with a groan of defeat.

“Fine, let’s just keep this to celebrate when we’re done. How long do you think this is gonna take?”

“With the both of us, I’d say four to five hours. Depends on how fast you read.”

“Ah. Better make it six, then,” he grinned just a bit sheepishly. “On the bright side, that means we’ll be done at two in the morning, so we can have a drink or two, ride a cab back to my place and call in sick tomorrow to spend the day in bed.”

“We?” she asked with a tongue-touched grin. “That’s a bit bold of you to assume I want to go to your place.”

“That’s a bit bold of you to assume I’m doing this out of charity. A favour for a favour, Doctor Tyler.”

“Wanker.”

“Obviously not for much longer.”

  
  


She faked an outraged gasp and playfully slapped his shoulder, but his laugh didn’t take long to trigger her own. She wondered if there really had been a time when they’d been at each other’s throats when he bent towards her with a bright smile and smacked his lips on her cheek. 

  
  


“Well go on, start working, Doctor Tyler,” he urged, nodding at her computer. “The faster we do this, the sooner I can get you out of that uncomfortable dress.”

  
  


She suddenly doubted her proofreading would be as qualitative as usual.

 

* * *

 


	9. Condescension

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone!
> 
> Back with a chapter for this one!  
> There will be an epilogue - because some asked for desk sex and I didn't want to fit that in here, and I need a proper conclusion to this anyway!
> 
> I hope you'll enjoy it, thanks for reading!

* * *

 

 

“And all done, Rose Tyler!” he suddenly announced with a loud clap of his hands, big smile splattered over his tired face. “God, I never want to hear anything about poetry and drama again. How can you spend your days studying this…  _ This _ ?”

“Could ask the same about your sciences, Smith,” she snorted a she leaned back into her chair, let her fingers fall over her keyboard. “Come on, forward me the files so I can send them all back to my students, and we’ll call it a night. I’m  _ knackered _ .”

“What about our drink?” he asked with a twinge of disappointment laced through his voice - he tried to hide the same disappointment that shone on his face, focussing hard on his screen to send her the documents, but she unfortunately noticed. “Nevermind. Sending them now.”

  
  


He cleared his throat, did his very best not to betray his feelings sticking his eyebrows together into a tight frown, did his very best to ignore the way her bare foot ran up his calf under the desk. So very unfair, she was, this Rose Tyler. Instead of precise and graceful slides, his mouse started to move with quick jerks of his hand, the clicks grew hurried, frantic, his eyes squinted imperceptibly so he wouldn’t lose track of that small arrow on his screen. Just because her foot travelled higher, over his knee, lingered there for a moment, then decided to caress a burning path over his thigh, until her toes met the growing bulge in his trousers.

 

Of course, he’d been so caught up in what he’d been doing, that was a distraction he could only enjoy, a distraction that reminded him of  the - rather brilliant - plan he’d come up with to spend the rest of the night. He didn’t necessarily  _ only  _ come for this, because he liked her, Hell he’d have said he loved her if he trusted his feelings enough, but that was an idea that had been floating around his head for a long time. 

 

She was bold. Very bold, for a literature nerd who spent her life nose-deep in poetry books. Not that he complained. He liked bold. He liked her a lot.

  
  


“Just saying we could skip the drink, go straight to the good part,” she said, almost sighed, lazily rubbing the sole of her foot over him.

“That’s a Nobel-worthy idea, Doctor Tyler,” he growled low in his throat, shifting his hips ever so slightly to alleviate the pressure or make it firmer, all he knew was that the distant idea of having sex with that woman was slowly turning to an explicit picture of making love to Rose Tyler against that very desk. “Sent the files, write your sodding emails.”

“I’ve already written the emails, just need to attach the files,” she hurried to answer - he thought he could see a blush rise on her cheeks, but it wasn’t embarrassment at all, judging by the way she looked at him with her teeth nibbling her lip. “Thanks for your help, by the way, Doctor Smith. Much appreciated”

“You’re very welcome, Doctor Tyler,” he shrugged, a shiver coursing down his spine as he moved away from her foot, stood up, walked behind her, bent over her back.

  
  


He pretended to look at what she was doing on her screen, but all he wanted was to be close to her, let his chin nestle in the crook of her shoulder, let his breath tease the skin of her neck. Because it was really unfair that he would be the only one to be aroused by her teasing, and he refused to be the only one throbbing in his pants.

 

She smelled nice, especially with his perfume, looked beautifully flustered - obviously she was seeing the same explicit picture he was. He stopped looking at her screen, eyes dropping to the perfect landscape of her cleavage offered by his position, hand twitching on the edge of her seat as if he was tempted to touch with his hungry fingers rather than his avid eyes. And sod it, he thought. She’d been bold, he could be bold, too. Not like they hadn’t expected this would happen. Not like they didn’t know they’d been lusting after each other for eons. Not like they didn’t know they’d both been pining for each other for ages. 

 

He turned his head just enough to lick the shell of her ear, slipped agile fingers under her dress, under her silk bra to cup her breast, felt her nipple tighten under his palm and welcomed the breathy moan she set free with a smile.

  
  


“Isn’t it an erotica cliché to have sex on your desk at work, Doctor Tyler?” he whispered into her ear as he gently massaged her flesh - never one to lose the upper hand, he realized when she reached behind her chair  to cup him through his trousers.

“Who said anything about having sex on my desk, Doctor Smith?” she let out through a sigh, bending her neck to the side so he could nuzzle and gently bite her skin. “Thought the plan was to get a taxi and go back to your place.”

“I could give you a quick lesson on probabilities, but if I’m not mistaken, you’ve already figured out there’s close to no chance we’ll make it out of here without having sex on that desk. Prove me wrong.”

“So condescending, John, so very arrogant. You’ll never learn to be humble, will you? Here, let me give you a quick lesson on what the word  _ humility  _ means.”

“Rose, that’s not…”

  
  


He frowned when she grasped his wrist and pulled his hand away, then stood from her chair before she started to walk towards the door, a swagger in her steps and a confidence in her gait that made his own crumble down to pieces. He couldn’t bear to see her go, couldn’t bear to have ruined everything because of his insolence he only intended to be teasing. 

 

He reached her before she could reach the door, and it only was when he made her spin around that he noticed her smirk. That woman wanted to kill him. It was a joke. A stupid, unnerving joke.

  
  


“I’m not a constant in your probability formula, Doctor Smith,” she taunted him, pulling on his tie to bring their faces close, so close he felt her mint breath on his nose and saw to the last nook in the maze of her deep whiskey irises. “I’m an awfully complicated variable in your nuclear fission equation. Could possibly lead to explosive results. I’m a linguist and a Doctor in English literature. Choose your words carefully, John.”

“You’re so bloody gorgeous when you talk about physics,” he sighed before he sa w her eyebrows shoot up and another grin tug at her lips. “Sorry, I meant, _of the very instant that I heard you speak about physics, did my heart fly at your service_.”

“Shakespeare, uh?”

“I’m sorry, that’s the only quote I know. Not good enough?”

“Well, you tried. It’ll have to do.”

  
  


He gasped into her mouth when she pulled him hard towards her, caught his lips in a bruising kiss that forbade him to add anything. He answered, as soon as his brain could process what was happening, as soon as he could control his body again. Their tongues met, hot, audacious, and their dance was more eloquent that any words of any language she would ever come up with. 

 

His hands grabbed her hips as they stumbled towards the filing cabinet against the wall, her back hit it with a dull metallic clank, his whole body pressed hard into her. Her hands went to his face, to his hair, to his neck, to his face again, unable to decide where to stay, unable to find anywhere good enough to pull him even closer. 

 

Oh, how much he loved kissing her. Warm and sweet and ferocious all at once, pliant lips and agile tongue and clacking teeth. 

 

She rolled her hips against him and moaned deep, just enough to set his loins on fire again, fan the flames of his desire that had almost died the moment she had walked away. He grew hard against her leg, jerked his hips forward to find some friction that only made his teeth bite harder into that plump lip.

  
  


“Tell me this isn’t a one-off,” he growled into the crook of her neck, just as her fingers went to his waist and slipped into his pants to grasp a firm hold of his length. “Please, Rose. Tell me this isn’t one of your games to drive me barmy again.”

  
  


The mix of searing desire and cold fear was awkward, and he desperately needed to assuage his doubts. Oh, he wanted the shag, and a moan ripped through his lungs when her thumb brushed against the head of his erection. But he also wanted the reassurance that it wouldn’t be just a shag between colleagues. He wanted it to mean more than that. 

 

He expected her to laugh, to mock, to take all these hopes he had that it meant as much to her as it meant to him and crush them. So many insecurities. His eyes fluttered shut and his lips pinched, disappointment rushing through him. Her hand went away, she pushed him away. That was it, he thought. 

 

But then she took a hold of his shoulders, and a second later he was the one pushed against the filing cabinet, her body pressed hard against his. Her hands cupped his cheeks and nothing happened for a moment. Until he opened his eyes again and saw her gentle smile, her quiet expression of fondness.

  
  


“It’s not a game to me, John,” she said softly before she planted a kiss to his jaw, his cheek, his lips. “What I want from you, and what I want to give you… It’s not a shag on my desk. I want more. I want  _ you _ .”

“I want you too, Rose. I’ve wanted you for so long, this just doesn’t feel… Can we just go back to my place? Please?”

“No shagging on the desk today, then?” she grinned, though without any malice, as she rolled her arms around him to draw him into a loose, comfortable hug. “I knew you were a hopeless romantic. I like it. Go on, make yourself decent while I call the cab.”

“Just so you know, I am planning to have sex on that desk at some point,” he chuckled a bit breathlessly, relieved to no end that they were riding the same wavelength. “Just… Not today. But we will.”

“Hopeless romantic  _ and  _ dreamer,” she smiled as she took his hand and brushed her lips against his knuckles. “You’ve spent far too long studying the stars, Doctor Smith.”

“Oh yes, years and years head up there in space. But now I’ve realized something.”

“Oh, and what would that be?”

“No star in the universe is a beautiful as you.”

“Oh, science geek compliment. I like it.”

“Plenty more where that came from, Doctor Tyler, you’ll hear them all soon enough.”

  
  


She erased his proud grin from his face with another kiss - how had he even lived without kissing her for all those years, he didn’t know - and he rolled an arm around her shoulders to cuddle her against his chest. They flicked the lights off and closed the door.

 

It hadn’t exactly been the perfect date he had planned. But then again, he supposed the conclusion wouldn’t have been much different. Now he was sure he really like her. And he was sure she liked him. He couldn’t find it in him to be disappointed by that awkward date when it only had superseded all of his best expectations. 

 

He was leaving with one Doctor Tyler clinging to his arm, moulding her body against his side, kissing his neck, laughing at his awful joke. Nope. Couldn’t have been any better.

 

* * *

 


End file.
